Friday, July 23, 2010

Little Spider Hunter Bird

A few days ago I was standing under the carpark at the front of the house when I noticed a very curious bird with a long curved beak fly over to one of the pink Bunga Kantan Flower (Torch Ginger Flower) buds by the house. When in flight, the bird seemed like it was a large Hummingbird, but after it took its place on the bud, I thought it was too big to be a Hummingbird. The bird was pecking his beak inside the holes of the bud in a fast motion. He saw me and continued pecking. I thought he might be trying to get the nectar inside the bud. After a long time I spoke to him and he looked at me and continued not bothered by me at all. Afterwards I searched online and found the bird which is a Little Spider Hunter (photo above from here: http://besgroup.talfrynature.com/2009/12/23/tongue-of-the-little-spiderhunter/ ). A few of the photos showed the Little Spider Hunter near Bunga Kantan Flower buds, so I know it is the same bird. It seems they do like to get the nectar out of the plant.